Paying the Price
by DrawnToDarkness
Summary: Prompt!Fic. Skye has the ability to heal those around her but at what cost to herself?


_Written for the prompt: Skye heals Ward with her abilities, her being an 084. Unbeknown to them, when she heals someone she takes on their injuries and she survives but it takes a few days to heal. Maybe Wards reaction leading to an outburst where he confesses he has feelings for her. Thanks_

Her abilities are something they've all come to accept.

The first time she healed one of them - May, if she recalls correctly - came completely out of the blue and freaked them all out, Skye more than anyone. It was just a little injury, a sprained wrist, but one that May couldn't function properly with and since they were in the middle of fighting for their lives, it kind of seemed important that it be fixed.

So Skye reached out, following some age-old instinct inside of her that she still doesn't understand, and touched the injured wrist, a gasp escaping her as she absorbed May's pain... and took the injury for herself.

None of the others figured out that that was what she'd done; they thought she'd healed it, made it better as if by magic. They didn't know the price she paid was to take the injury herself and Skye wasn't about to tell them.

The second time it happened, it was Simmons. The biochemist scolded herself quite badly while working in the lab and Skye, hating the sting of tears in the eyes of the young woman who'd become one of her closest friends _ever_, did what she needed to do to make the pain go away.

(The slight scarring she now wears on her upper arm, hidden from view most of the time, is a badge of honour of sorts. A reminder that she cares - and is cared about - for what feels like the first time in her life even if that isn't strictly true.)

She keeps on doing it, taking on the unofficial role of team healer. Coulson's warned her against the big gestures, fear in his eyes that she's sure he didn't want her to see as he thinks about the people who would hurt her because of her gift finding out about her abilities and where she is if the wrong person should see her do it.

Regardless, Skye continues, and she doesn't tell them, not once, that the cost of healing means taking on their pain as her own - it's a debt she thinks she's long-owed to the village and agents who gave their lives for her when she was no more than a child.

And then Ward gets hurt.

Stabbed.

The wound is deep but thankfully not fatal (she hopes.) Still, it causes him a great deal of pain and discomfort and she hates the pained look on his face that he's trying to hide so she doesn't hesitate in reaching out, fingers ghosting over the wound as she closes her eyes... and takes it for herself.

The blood surprises her. It's the first time she's used her powers and ended up bleeding as a result.

She thinks it surprises Ward more, though, especially since her last memory for a while is the sight of his stricken face as he leaps off the makeshift hospital bed in the lab-come-medical bay in order to catch her before she can hit the ground, blood staining her hands as she presses them against her stomach.

When she wakes up, it's to find the team have called some kind of intervention.

Coulson tells her sternly that she's not allowed to use her gifts any more if it means she ends up getting hurt.

When she tries to protest, May chimes in, a stern expression on her face that eerily reminds Skye of one of the Sisters at St Agnes.

Fitz looks at her like she's a little bit crazy to have done such a thing (and maybe she is, so Skye doesn't argue) while Simmons looks upset, no doubt remembering how her own suffering was once cut short because of Skye's gift and realising that the pain she'd once felt relieved to be rid of had merely been transferred instead of completely erased.

It's Ward's reaction that hits her the hardest, though, the one he keeps from showing until they're alone in the lab and Skye has lifted the hem of the shirt she's somehow wearing to view the neat stitches in her stomach.

"Maybe it'll leave a scar," she says, when the silence gets too much for her. "That'd be kind of cool. My first battle wound!"

(She doesn't count the scar from Jemma's burn since it happened in a lab accident and not out on a mission.)

"Don't you _ever_ do this again," Ward tells her, his voice low and gravelly and somehow different to how she's ever heard it before. She's stunned by both it and the almost crazed look in his eye that for the first time that she can remember, Skye is actually - truly - speechless. "You can't risk your own life for anyone else, Skye. It's not worth it. I'm not worth it."

"I'd beg to differ on that." She would; in her eyes, his life is worth more than hers. He's a bona fide good guy, through and through, while she - up until joining the team - has made more mistakes than she'd care to admit. She lifts her gaze to his with effort. "It's my choice to make."

"No, it isn't." He drags a hand through his hair, seeming uncomfortable in his own skin, which is something she can't recall seeing before. "Damn it, Skye. You're not allowed to die."

"Because so many have died to save me?" She tilts her head to the side and wonders at the flash of _something_ in his eyes. "I don't want to add your name to that list, Ward. Or May's or Coulson's or FitzSimmons."

"That's not it," he tells her, and he seems a little bit... well, frustrated, that she doesn't understand what he seems to be trying to tell her. "You. Cannot. Die. I can't watch that happen, Skye. I can't..."

He breaks off but continues to hold her gaze.

Skye gasps at what she sees on his face, her heart starting to race so fast she's sure the machines she's still hooked up to are going to start beeping crazily at any moment.

"Ward... _Grant_..."

He moves in the blink of an eye, cups her face in his hands and rests his forehead against hers. "I can't watch you die, Skye, because I think it would kill me, too. And if you're gone... Who's going to make it better?"

There's no way she could respond to the heart-wrenching anguish in his voice, even if her voice wouldn't fail her if she tried, so Skye does the only thing she can think of and tilts her head, brushing her lips almost cautiously against his.

She's relieved when he responds, lets her eyes slide shut as the hands cupping her face move to tangle in her hair as the kiss deepens yet doesn't lose any of its sweetness.

"I'll always be here," she murmurs, hoping as she speaks that what she says is the truth. "I'm not going to die on you. I promise."

Ward releases a shaky breath but instead of calling her out on the possible lie, he kisses her again instead.

**  
End.


End file.
